


Yar

by Tammany



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Backstory, First Time, Gen, M/M, Speculation, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-15
Updated: 2014-05-15
Packaged: 2018-01-24 21:22:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1617530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tammany/pseuds/Tammany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is another attempt to play with Mycroft as buttoned down, with an added scoop of Mycroft as having something sad and complicated in his backstory and as having obvious outstanding trust and control issues. Virtually none of this is canon, but instead a good time fiddling around in what the lacunae of canon may hide. </p><p>I do not believe in instant relationships. I do, however, believe that there are some friendships/romances/relationships that click: people you can trust when you should not trust them. People you can give control to, even when you're bad at giving up control. People with the skills and empathy to work with their friends' neuroses, rather than rub them up the wrong way leaving them looking and feeling like spikey little hedgehogs. In this story, Greg does prove to be that for Mycroft. It's not "logical," it's emotional--as much a thing of alchemy and magic as Sherlock and John. Something that works, even when perhaps it shouldn't.</p><p>Torchy, erotica, maybe porn lite.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yar

 

“The statistical averages suggest it would be a fool’s choice,” Mycroft said to Lestrade, meeting his eyes without flinching. “Unlike many, I don’t consider bisexuals inherently unreliable or inclined to toy with gay partners. The numbers, however, are simply against the gay partner. They’re quite simple and obvious. You will always have more access to female lovers than to male lovers—there are more straight women than gay men. You will always have a rational exit strategy available to you: it is easier to be straight than to live gay, and easier to live gay than to live as a bisexual, not entirely trusted by either side.” He shrugged. “It’s classic strategic wisdom: avoid circumstances where you will inevitably be the weaker party with the more limited set of options.”

Lestrade didn’t look away—brown eyes steady and considering. “Not going to argue numbers with you, Mycroft,” he said, leaning in the big armchair, fingers tracing the fanning metal of the chair arm. “I will ask how that’s really any different from any other pairing. Either you’re with someone right, who will stick with you, or you’re not. And it’s a gamble either way.” He held up his left hand, the back turned to Mycroft, fingers spread wide. He waggled the empty ring finger. “You can marry straight and still be abandoned. Happens every day. And it doesn’t matter half so much as you’d think whether you’re ditched by a man or a woman. Either way you’re just as alone. That one I can tell you first hand.”

Mycroft scowled and looked down at his desk—his clean, empty desk, so smooth and without feature that no one could imagine he was actually doing anything but avoiding that steady gaze. He didn’t want to fall back on an argument from feeling—admit that it was hard enough to buck the numbers and find a partner at all, with the numbers against you, without losing him to a woman. That it was like having it shoved in his face that his love was unnatural, less valuable, less worth preserving. It was true, though. If straight women felt shamed when their husbands left them for gay men, gay men felt no less shamed and rejected when their men left for women. Worse, he thought. It wasn’t just a matter of being alone, it was a matter of being tossed aside for “normal.” For “healthy.” For “moral and upright.” Meanwhile the one left behind had to linger, still trapped in “the love that dare not speak its name.”

He’d lived his life refusing to sacrifice his dignity on the altar of normalcy. His brains. His orientation. His introversion. His profession. Any and all made him a freak in some eyes; he’d refused to live out that judgment, though. Except once…

“It’s not the same,” he said, knowing he sounded mulish and sullen….and unable to control his voice—the inflections, the intonations—to sound otherwise.

He heard Lestrade stir in the chair. He could almost hear the man thinking, as Sherlock sometimes claimed he could. After a few moments he said, simply, “How? Can you explain how it’s different?”

Not without humiliating myself, Mycroft thought; then, “Bugger, why not,” he said, and raised his right hand. The gold ring shone.

“Wedding ring?”

“No,” Mycroft said, temper held barely in check. “If it had been it might have ended differently. As it was—well. It wasn’t _real_ you see. Not legal—and even if it had been legal, as it is now, it wouldn’t have _counted._ A mistake. Less worthy of mention than even an annulment. He’d met a woman. She was having his baby, and now ‘things were getting _real_ real fast.’ Not even a ‘let’s be friends.’ Instead what he said was, ‘I know it will be better for your career if we don’t see each other much. And you’re not petty enough to tell my wife.’ You see? When you’re the gay man being rejected, there’s nothing to hold on to, nothing to fight back with. No one even sympathizes. After all, you should have known better.”

Lestrade made a soft, considering sound—not quite a “huh,” not a “hmmm,” but something soft and thoughtful. “Yeah. Ok. I could probably stretch this out a few more rounds of ‘mine’s worse than yours.’ At least make it an interesting fight. But I’m not gonna. You win. Yours is worse. Is it any better when a gay man leaves you for another gay man? Really? Reliably?”

“You’re giving me more credit for extended experience than I deserve,” Mycroft said, dryly. “There haven’t been any others I attempted long-term relations with.”

“I see.” He stretched. His hands rose, fingertip meeting finger-tip, creating an airy, open arcade of five arches. He looked past them, studying Mycroft. “But it’s still the same, in the end. One attempt. One loss, One victory. Unless you’re trying for poly, when you can attempt victory and defeat in multiples and get your experience points faster. What’s it called? Conservation of pain? One relationship, one hurt.”

No, Mycroft thought. One loss—a million hurts. Pride, courage, self-respect. He’d actually begged Allan to reconsider… Allen had laughed; not to be cruel, but in shaken disbelief that Mycroft could have thought he had any claim, compared to the short, plain woman with the big belly living in the little flat over a shop. A woman who’d accomplished no more in life than to pass her O-levels, hold a job in a dry cleaners, and learn how to apply makeup. And pick up men. Married men.

And get knocked up.

Beside that all Mycroft had to offer was trivia. Frivolous.

“It’s different,” he said, angry, but not sure whom he was angry with. Allan? The little tart he’d married? At himself, for being idiot enough to beg? Lestrade, for bringing it all back, and making it so damned tempting to try again…? “Why are you asking? Why are you trying to reason with me?”

Lestrade flicked a brow, still staring at Mycroft through the arches of his fingers. “You’re a man of reason. It seemed….right. Better than trying to tempt you with a simple pull, yeah?”

Mycroft snorted. “I suppose. The second would be hopeless from the start.”

“You think?” Lestrade’s eyes never left him. “Yeah. You do think.” He sounded amused. Still that dark, soft gaze held, never leaving Mycroft.

“I assure you, a simple ‘pull’ would be a waste of your time, DI Lestrade.”

No answer but a little, mischievous grin—and dark eyes. Then, after far too long, far too many second whispering silently away, he said, in a near whisper, “Prove it.”

“What?”

“Prove it’s a waste of my time.”

Mycroft frowned. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve already made my position clear.”

Lestrade stood, then, slow and easy. He let his arms hang loose; he turned his palms out in a position Mycroft instantly recognized: I have no weapons. I am not an aggressor. A negotiating posture used regularly by a policeman—when stepping warily into a “domestic,” breaking up a brawl in a pub or a club, preparing to cuff a still restless, hyper thief who’s surrendered but not yet let go of the adrenaline rush of the confrontation…

I won’t hurt you. I won’t rush you. You still have some control… just go along with me. I’ll bring us out the other side safe….

Mycroft licked his lips, suddenly flushed and edgy—the exact reverse of what that posture should suggest. But there were those eyes—sweet, dark, sloe-eyed… “What are you up to, Lestrade?”

The other man smiled, and stepped toward the desk—a single step, hands still promising peace. “Depends on what you want.”

Mycroft scowled. “I told you what I want.”

“You told me what you fear. What you think. Can you prove a pull wouldn't be different?”

“I don’t ‘do’ pull, Lestrade. I don’t do clubs, I don’t come on to strangers in pubs.”

Lestrade walked on, slow, steady, unhesitant but unhurried. He cut around the end of the desk, and came to stand by Mycroft’s chair, almost between Mycroft’s knees as he swung the chair around to face the oncoming threat.

He said nothing. Just stood, looking down, eyes warm, the faintest wash of a smile seeming to hover, false-dawn before some promising golden sunrise.

Mycroft considered. “I could tell you to leave.”

“I’d leave.”

“You would?” He half hoped Lestrade wouldn’t—that he’d play out some dominant, macho game that would either sweep Mycroft away or make him so angry that the shivery lure of those eyes no longer mattered.

“I would.”

It was clear he would. All Mycroft had to do was tell him to go, and he’d be gone. Mycroft frowned, forcing himself to stillness, waiting.

He knew already that he didn’t want Lestrade to leave. That he never had wanted him to leave.

That he was terrified he’d stay.

“I can’t,” he said, relieved his voice was steady. He shook his head, helpless. His hands lay in his lap, the fingers of his left stroking the gold ring on his right. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

Lestrade cocked his head—an odd, spontaneous movement, bird-like, alert. Then one palm turned over, his hand began to rise.

“Lestrade…”

The hand stopped. “Your pick.”

“I don’t…know what to think.” He looked at the hand, hovering still, slightly raised, fingers loose and naturally curved.

“Some things aren’t about what you think.”

“What?”

“They’re about what you want. The logic comes after.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I can’t… People don’t…”

The hand waited, patient.

Mycroft shivered, and licked his lips.

“It’s not about win or lose. It’s not about who’s in charge. It’s just about what you want,” Lestrade said.

Mycroft liked his voice—a pleasing light baritone, a bit growly, but nothing like the rumbling surge of Sherlock’s voice. Friendly, warm, without pretension, brimming with good humor, reflecting every mood like water reflected light off every ripple…

What Mycroft wanted and what Mycroft allowed himself were not the same thing, and hadn’t been for a very, very long time. Even before Allan…

Lestrade’s hand rose, slightly, shaking from muscles held steady too long. He flexed his fingers toward Mycroft’s shirt. “May I?”

For a long moment, Mycroft watched the hand shiver in midair. “No,” he said, then, quickly, before the hand could pull away, “Yes.” He drew a deep breath, hands still clutched together. “Yes.”

He watched Lestrade’s hand approach. The index and middle finger slipped between the second and third buttons of his shirt, and tugged lightly upward. Mycroft, startled, looked up, meeting smiling eyes. He felt the steady pull of cotton across his chest, into his armpits, at the back of his neck.

Lestrade’s eyes asked. Mycroft’s lips tightened…then relaxed. He gave a tiny nod, and stood. His calves knocked the chair back, and it whispered away on well-oiled casters. He was belly to belly with Lestrade, taller by about two inches, of lankier build—a flamingo compared to a sturdy, solid owl, he thought.

Two fingers, still tucked beneath the button placket of his shirt, tugged him lightly down, now, suggesting he lean over just a little. Just enough.

Who was in charge, Mycroft wondered. Lestrade asked—he never took, he asked. But when he asked, Mycroft couldn’t find it in himself to say no. He brought up his right hand, ignoring the gold glimmer of his ring, and covered Lestrade’s, then leaned down, resting his forehead at the crest of Lestrade’s brow.

Lestrade— _Greg_ —turned his face up, let his lips graze Mycroft’s…then waited.

Mycroft felt desire go off like dynamite tossed into a loch full of salmon, then—the explosion powerful, churning deep waters. He took Greg’s mouth, clutched his sides to pull him close and closer, gasped and dove in again, tongue tracing teeth, slick inner lips and cheeks, tangling against Greg’s tongue. He’d forgotten sex could take him like this—if he’d ever known in the first place. There was ebb and flow, advance and retreat, movement occurring at the very edges of his awareness—and somehow he found he and Greg had cross the room and found the sofa in the conversation nook reserved for less formal meetings. What should have been a wild tumble to the rich, supple leather of the sofa was unexpectedly graceful, each finding a spot with enough leverage to do more than wallow helplessly in the dense padded upholstery.

He forced himself to pay attention and realized Greg was managing them, like a skilled rider would manage a half-broken mount, or a brilliant dancer a novice on the dance floor. Part of him wanted to squall protest, scramble up, tidy himself, refuse to be controlled so easily.

The rest of him muttered something rude and threw caution and dignity to the winds, handing Greg control with a good will as he abandoned himself to lovemaking.

Later he’d manage to draw details from memory…strong hands guiding, giving cues, stilling him when he moved too quickly, a soft voice urging him on when he loitered or drew back, intimidated by his own sweeping fugue. The slip of a thigh between his, giving him something to rock and thrust against. Laughter as Greg slowed him, insisted on fewer clothes as a condition that had to be met before going completely berserk.

There were trust exercises that were practiced for certain kinds of work within the agency. Everything from team-building projects to trivial mosh-pit style group activities where one victim—as Mycroft always saw it—threw himself or herself blindly into the arms of waiting team members. Mycroft always got top scores from instructors—and flunked dismally when tested using psych evaluations and actual sensor devices to pick up bodily changes and response. As one psychiatrist stated it, “Mycroft fakes trust remarkably well for a complete paranoid.”

He would later wish he could claim to have been gentle—instead it would be more honest to say he’d been willing to let Greg guide him into gentleness. He would wish he had been tender—instead Greg had forced him to pause, to savour, to share. He would wish he had been giving—instead he had allowed Greg to take all his raw need and turn it, by some strange alchemy, into a gift that passed between them, enriching both.

He had been hungry, desperate, fierce; as ragged in his control as if he came wobble-legged and rambunctious as a spring kid, leaping forward, toppling over, struggling back. Somewhere in their passion, they slid off the sofa. Somewhere in their passion they found it didn’t matter, rating only a roar of laughter, a quick squirm as they rearranged themselves, and then it was forgotten. When he was done, and they both lay spent on the carpet, panting, all he could say was, “Sorry. Sorry. Hell. Sorry. Give me another chance and I’ll do better. Really….” He hung, just short of tears at his own shortcomings.

Beside him Greg laughed, softly, “Silly berk,” he said, and rolled over. His lower arm lay under his head. His upper sprawled over Mycroft’s waist. “You did fine.”

Mycroft swallowed, and shook his head. “No finesse. No…Hell. I honestly can do better.”

“You were brilliant. It was like sailing a little dinghy on a tidal wave and not just ending up alive, but having a great ride the whole way through. Like waltzing with a cyclone—and having it follow your lead. Do that again and I’ll die happy.” He laughed, eyes bright and friendly.

Mycroft wanted to wrap him up, call in security, and lock him in the basement of Baskerville so he could never get away—never in a million years. The longing shook through him. His thumb reached across the palm of his right hand, found the curve of the ring as it ran under his finger. He turned the ring, and turned it, jaw clenching on all the wrong words crowding to be said. Silence served him best—silence had always served him best.

“Trust me,” Greg whispered. “I won’t promise to stay—but I promise not to promise unless I’m sure. And I promise it’s not just a game, you silly berk.” His hand found Mycroft’s and covered it, his thumb ducked under the edge of his palm and found Mycroft’s turning the ring and turning it. “Shhhh. Leave off, love. Trust me.”

“I’m bad at that,” Mycroft said—barely, his voice threatening to betray him entirely.

“No, you’re not,” Greg answered. He laughed. “In the immortal words of _Philadelphia Story_ —you’re yar. A sweet, fine boat, quick to respond to the tiller. Absolutely wizard.”

Mycroft shook his head—and gripped Greg’s hand, tight, so he wouldn’t spin the ring. “I can show you my psych scores,” he said mournfully. “I’m rubbish at trust. I may be the only person in MI6 who ever passed the trust tests on acting talent alone.”

“Idiot,” Lestrade murmured. He sat for a moment, frowning. “Is there a jacket or a blanket or something in here? I’m bloody freezing.”

“Ornamental throw on the chair to your left,” Mycroft said.

“Thank God.” He rose, fetched the soft, elegant throw, and tossed it lightly across Mycroft, then slid down under and nestled close again. “I’ll give you a second chance, and a third, and a fourth, and probably more. But that’s because I always meant to, and you deserve ‘em anyway.”

Mycroft nodded, and closed his eyes.

His mind, ever seeking out problems, worried—that he’d love this man too much. That he loved him too much already. That he’d lose him too soon. That he’d disappoint him. That they’d disappoint each other.

“Shhhh,” Lestrade whispered. “You’re thinking too loud. It’s all good, you silly posh plonker.”

Mycroft thought, “But…”

“I heard that,” Greg said, chuckling. “Shhhh.”

Mycroft, lying on the wool carpet, under a fussy little cashmere throw, wondered how he’d lost control…

And whether it mattered….

And if you could pass the test of trust by throwing yourself into terror, and giving up the lead…

“Shhhh, love. Shhhhh.”

And then, at last, he slept, thumb still stroking a golden ring.


End file.
